The European Union has imposed a ban on imports from Russia of a range of plastics.

The EU has imposed further sanctions on Russian exports, including chemical products and a range of plastics, in response to Russia's annexation of occupied Ukrainian territories. The import ban has been in effect since Oct. 6 and affects all Russian-produced plastic precursors, such as ethylene, propylene and butadiene, as well as the polymers polyethylene, polypropylene, polycarbonate, styrenics and polyamides. In the first half of 2022, imports of polyethylene into the EU had still increased significantly by 63 percent to 136,000 metric tons compared to the first half of 2021, according to Russia's Rosstat statistics agency, and European companies' imports of polypropylene had increased by 43 percent to 196,000 metric tons. The reason for the significant increase in demand was probably fears among European customers that they would no longer be able to obtain material after the EU sanctions came into force, the agency said.
 

Sources:

• Kunststoff Information (Oct. 12, 2022)
• Photo: unsplash.com, Christian Lue